


The Dragon's Heart

by bagginshieldhappiness



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, BAMF Bilbo, BAMF Dís and Thorin sibling duo, Dis goes with on the journey, M/M, Multi, Slow Burn, socially awkward Thorin, the arkenstone is different from the book/movies, the beginning takes place in Erid Luin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-19
Updated: 2015-04-19
Packaged: 2018-03-23 15:03:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3772699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bagginshieldhappiness/pseuds/bagginshieldhappiness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bilbo is brought to Ered Luin for a year of preparation before the journey to reclaim the mountain.  Dís will go with them on the quest while her sons remain in the Blue Mountains.  And Bilbo Baggins will be their dragon slayer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Dragon's Heart

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this idea in my head for a while now and I've finally decided pursue it. I love Dís and I'm excited to have her as one of the main characters in this fic. The rating may go up eventually.
> 
> I hope everyone enjoys it.

Bilbo hummed beneath his breath, a merry bounce in his steps as he moved from one end of the kitchen to the other.  It was a bright day filled with sunlight and the happy sounds of birds twittering from treetops.  But it was happiest of all for a certain hobbit because jam tarts were being freshly baked, the smell drifting from the oven and spreading throughout his home by an incoming breeze through an open window.  Baking did wonders for elevating one's mood, and Bilbo felt as though nothing could sour his outlook on that particular morning.  Even if a Sackville-Baggins showed up at his door he would still manage to feel cheerful.

There was nothing particularly extraordinary about the day to make him feel that way.  But a day didn't need to be special to be celebrated in the Shire.  It was enough to simply be alive and well enough to eat and enjoy the quiet pleasures of existence in a land of green hills, abundant trees, and overall prosperity.  

The hobbit knew exactly what he would do with his remaining hours of daylight.  He would sample his baking, enjoy his favorite stash of pipeweed, and bask in the afternoon's warmth while sitting in his garden.  Perhaps during the evening he would relax in his armchair and read tales of great adventures.

And nothing would disrupt these plans, because there were rarely disruptions or great happenings in the Shire.  It was the small things that mattered and were cherished.  Adventures and extraordinary events were kept safely tucked away in the pages of books where a hobbit might privately allow their imagination to drift.  But _only_ their imagination.

Well, save for a few.  Belladonna Took, Bilbo's own mother, hadn't found satisfaction with simply reading about adventures.  She'd actually gone on one!  To Bilbo's knowledge his mother had been going about her life as normally as ever when a wizard had shown up and whisked her away!

And when she had finished with her adventure she had turned around and marched straight back home, dusted off her hands, and dared to settle back into shire life as though nothing had happened.  She'd even had the nerve to marry a Baggins from one of the most respectable and well-to-do families in all of the Shire.  

Some had whispered that she'd used fairy magic to lure Bungo into her arms.  Others gossiped that she'd conjured one of the grey wizard's dark spells to snare him.  Everyone agreed that Bungo had to be out of his senses to marry a wild Took such as her.  
  
To this day some of the whispers followed her only son, though most knew him to be a pleasant and respectable gentlehobbit who (thankfully) took after his father and didn't have an ounce of Tookish thirst for trouble.

So when a wizard had approached Bilbo on that ordinary afternoon while he was enjoying his favorite pipe and minding his own business,  he knew what had to be done.  He firmly refused to hear any talk of adventures and bid the grey fellow a good day before rushing back inside to the safety of Bag End, where no stray adventures would be able to ensnare him.  Or so he thought.

  
  
Later that evening there was a knock at the door.  Bilbo had just sat down for a second supper and wasn't expecting any visitors at such a late hour.  He shrugged and took a bite from a biscuit, deciding to ignore whoever it was.  Everyone knew it was rude to interrupt a hobbit's supper, and there was very little that could in fact part one from their food once they were determined to eat.

But then there was another knock.  The mystery visitor was annoyingly persistent.  With any luck it was one of his nosy relatives who had come to pester him.

With a sigh Bilbo set the biscuit down and rose to his feet.  He gave the food a mournful look of parting before he went to find out who it was at his door.

What he discovered when he opened it nearly gave him a fright.  Standing in his doorway was one of the largest, strongest, fiercest looking dwarves he'd ever laid eyes on.  He had furs covering his ridiculously broad shoulders and a pronounced beard sprouting from his chin, and he looked as though he could eat a platter of hobbits for dinner and still be hungry.

"Dwalin, at your service," the stranger spoke gruffly with a slight bow.

"Bilbo Baggins, at yours," the shocked hobbit greeted without thinking as he moved aside in a daze.  The Dwarf ducked through the entryway and marched inside without hesitating.

Then two other figures emerged from the night's darkness.  Bilbo had heard tales of the beauty of the fair people, but never had he heard of the beauty of dwarves.  The pair had dark raven hair that flowed across their shoulders and piercing blue eyes that watched him.  Both had beards though one wore theirs longer and kept it decorated with twists of metal and shimmering gemstones that shone in the moonlight. 

"I- ah.."  He was truly at a loss for words.  "Hello."

He was given twin nods of acknowledgement before the pair swept inside.  

The hobbit was so distracted by their presence that he didn't notice the wizard had joined them.  "Ah, Bilbo," he greeted in a cordial tone that made their host bristle with irritation.  The hobbit knew immediately that this was all the grey wizard's doing.  "Allow me to introduce your guests.  This is Thorin Oakenshield, son of Thráin, and his sister Dís, daughter of Thráin.  And Dwalin, son of Fundin," Gandalf motioned toward each of them.  "Thorin is heir to a dwarven kingdom."  So they were siblings, as Bilbo had suspected, and of royal blood too.  They were so alike in appearance that he wondered if they were twins.

"So this is the hobbit," the dark haired dwarf to his left spoke lowly, circling around him.

"Gandalf, you didn't tell us he's so adorable!" the other exclaimed.  Bilbo blinked.  The other of the noble and elegant dwarves, the sister, had stepped closer as well.  He felt thoroughly surrounded. "He's tiny.  And look at those little pointed ears.  They look like little elf ears."

"He's no elf," Thorin interjected at the same time that Bilbo protested "I'm not an elf!"

They both paused to look at one another in surprise.

Bilbo cleared his throat, flushing slightly as he turned to the sister.  "Haven't you seen a hobbit before?"

"Of course.  However your kind sneak about so quietly that you'll miss one if you dare to blink," she chuckled, a mirthful gleam in her winter blue eyes that caught him off guard.

"He looks more like a grocer than a burglar," Thorin smirked down at him, and Bilbo felt himself frown. He recognized it as a slight even if he didn't know what was meant by _'burglar.'_  

"Thorin, you're insulting the poor hobbit and we've just met him," Dís swatted her brother's arm.  "The wizard couldn't have chosen a cuter burglar."

"I'm more concerned with his ability to survive outside his own front door than whether or not he's _cute._ "

Bilbo scoffed at that.  "I've spent plenty of time outside my front door.  Did either of you happen to notice the garden out there?  And while it's lovely to meet you both, I'm afraid I'm not sure what you're doing here.  Does anyone care to explain?"  He looked to Gandalf, and the wizard purposely avoided meeting his eye.  "You see, it isn't every day that dwarven royalty shows up at my door and insults me."

Dís and her brother exchanged a look.  It was Thorin who spoke, "We've come to offer you something."

"Offer me something?"  What did they mean to offer _him?_

"An opportunity."

Bilbo waited for an explanation that didn't come as silence stretched on between them. "Well, that certainly explains it!" he said with a bit of a chuckle.  "An opportunity.  Now it all makes sense."

Dís let out a sigh.  "What my brother means to say is that we've come to _ask_ ," she looked pointedly at her brother, and to Bilbo's surprise Thorin shifted uncomfortably, "for a favor."

He was growing more suspicious of their motives with each second.  "What sort of favor?"  He couldn't imagine what they'd want from him.  To his knowledge dwarves were self sufficient and distinctly secretive, rarely, if ever, requiring assistance from another race.  They especially weren't known for interacting with hobbits.  

The sister laid a hand on her brother's arm to stop him from saying whatever it was he'd been about to respond with.  "Have you ever heard of Erebor, Master Baggins?" she asked.

"It sounds vaguely familiar."  Perhaps his mother had mentioned it once.  She had been a hobbit with had an uncanny love for travel and unusual tales after all.

"Erebor was once our home.  A great and sturdy mountain far east of here.  It was the mightiest of kingdoms and we prospered there beneath the mountain with gold and gems aplenty.  The city of Dale neighboring us was where we traded for food."  Bilbo could sense a deep current of emotion between all three dwarves while she shared their story.  "We thought it could go on forever.  That prosperity was ours to have."

She swept a strand of hair from her face.  "We lost it all to a dragon.  He burned our halls and ate our children, our brothers and kin.  Forced us to flee from the walls of our own kingdom."  Her voice was thick with sorrow and Bilbo felt a sudden and overwhelming pang of sympathy for her and for all of her kind who had suffered through such a fate.  "We were once a noble people, Bilbo Baggins, brought to our knees by a ruthless worm.  And the _elves_ ,"  He noticed Thorin grow tense, "They turned their backs.  We had no one.  Nowhere to go.  So we drifted for years, wanderers who labored in the cities of men."  She closed her eyes and let out a breath.  "We knew true hardship then.  Poverty and humiliation.  And we've struggled ever since to find our place in this world."

Bilbo wished he could do or say something to comfort them both.  It was a tale of such tragedy that he could hardly comprehend it. "I'm sorry for what happened. Truly.  But what of Ered Luin?  Is that not your home now?" he cautiously asked.  His mother had told him of the Blue Mountains and the dwarves that lived there, and until just now he'd been under the impression that it was where they belonged.

Blue eyes flashed open and she turned to the hobbit as though she'd forgotten he was there at all, so engrossed was she in her thoughts.  "We've lived there for a time, yes.  And we are grateful for the shelter we've found in the Blue Mountains.  But it will never be home.  Not as Erebor was."

"Again, I _am_ sorry to hear that.  But where exactly do I fit in with all of this?  You said you've come to ask a favor."

"Yes, we have."  There was some sort of amulet she wore around her neck which she absentmindedly toyed between her fingertips.  "My brother's pride prevents him from asking, and believe me when I say that my own makes it difficult."  She sighed.  "We've come to ask you to help us reclaim Erebor."

Bilbo's eyes widened in shock.  Surely he'd misunderstood.  "You want me to help you.  _Me._   A hobbit of the Shire.  Help you to reclaim a faraway kingdom overtaken by a dragon."  

She laughed then.  "It sounds insane, _trust me_ , I'm aware. We're desperate, Master Baggins. We can't stay in the Blue Mountains.  We have no reliable food source.  Scarcely any gold.  We survive there, barely, never thriving.  It isn't how our people are meant to exist.  Erebor is our only hope."

He opened and closed his mouth several times as he tried to find the right words to respond.  The idea was so unexpected and absurd that he could scarcely believe she'd said it.  "I fail to see how I could be of assistance.  You mentioned a dragon.  From what I've read in stories one doesn't just walk up to a dragon and offer it tea and then ask it to shoo."

"We won't ask it anything," Thorin's deep voice nearly startled a jump from the hobbit.  "We're going to kill it."

Oh, well.  "That's all very brave and daring, but again I don't see what use I would be."

"You'll be the one to slay it."

"Oh," he spoke breathlessly.  "Oh dear."  Suddenly he felt he couldn't breathe.  The room was slowly beginning to spin as images of sharp and piercing teeth flashed across his vision.  He saw searing claws and was certain he could feel the heat of the dragon's deadly breath melting his skin.  

And that was when everything went black.

  
  
When he awoke it was to the outline of figures hovering above him.  He heard fragments of conversation though it all sounded muddled and twisted.

"Fainting at the mere mention of killing a dragon.  He'll never survive out there!"

"You can't just bring up dragon slaying like that!  He needed to be told gently.  These halflings are more delicate than dwarves."

"Exactly.  Far too delicate for this mission."

And then the words changed, blurring into a language he wasn't familiar with.

Bilbo groaned and rubbed his head in an effort to block out the noise.  "Move away, move away!"  It was the wizard's voice that cut through the argument, and suddenly he was aware that someone was kneeling down beside him.  "Are you alright, my dear hobbit?"

Bilbo blinked and found that his eyes now adjusted to the light above, and he could make out Gandalf's face looking down at him.  "I had the strangest dream that there were dwarves in my house.  Dwarves who wanted me to kill a dragon, of all things!"  He began to push himself up and Gandalf aided him.  

The hobbit glanced around.  Oh.  There _were_ dwarves in his house.  "So it wasn't a dream."

"Bilbo, I do believe it would be wise to relocate elsewhere.  Somewhere we can all sit.  Perhaps the dining room?" the wizard suggested.

"Yes, alright."

By the time they made it to the dining area they discovered that the over sized dwarf named Dwalin had already found it and decided to help himself to Bilbo's forgotten dinner.  "It was getting cold.  Seemed a waste," he roughly explained between mouthfuls.  Bilbo winced as his own stomach rumbled and waved it away as he lowered into a chair.  He would have to make do with a snack once he found a way to sneak off to the pantry.

Once they were all seated at the table he studied each of his guests. "You actually expect me to do it.  To kill a dragon."    

"Yes," Thorin answered simply.

"No," Dís spoke at the same time.

The hobbit frowned in confusion, not for the first time that evening.  "I see.  That clears it up."

"It isn't as simple as that, is what we mean." Dís gave her brother another harsh look.  "Do you have any idea of how dragons are slain?"

"Not really, no.  Though I do know from reading books that they're very clever and difficult to kill."

"Nearly impossible to kill.  But they have a weakness.  Only one, yet a fatal weakness it is."

"And that would be?-" He found he was honestly curious to know.

"The arkenstone."

"The dragon's heart," Thorin murmured.

Dís leaned forward against the table, pinning the hobbit with an intense expression.  He suspected that both she and her brother were masters of such intensity. "When a dragon hatches from its egg it isn't the only thing that emerges from the shell.  Each young Worm carries with it a gem, a physical symbol of its life force.  The beast will keep it close and guarded it for the entirety of its life.  If it's ever parted from this treasure it will cease to live."  A slow smile spread to her lips.  "Steal the dragon's heart and the monster will be ended."

Realization struck him.  _Burglar,_ Thorin had called him.  "That's what you want me to do.  You want me to steal this stone."  It did indeed, finally, make sense.  But there was still one thing.  "That doesn't explain why you'd choose a hobbit for this task."

"Gandalf has told us of hobbits," Thorin spoke up.  "He insists that you're lightfooted, stealthy, and capable of sneaking away from threats."

"Well, yes, I suppose."

"Though I can see you aren't suited for the wild."

"Which is why," Dís cut in with a firm tone, "he'll be prepared."

Bilbo felt he was would be anything but prepared for this madness.  The hobbit sprung to his feet suddenly, pacing.  "It's a brilliant idea.  Excellent.  But there's a problem, you see."  He held up a finger for emphasis.  "The problem is that I can't just run off into the blue.  I'm a respectable hobbit.  I have responsibilities, a home to tend to.  _This_ house.  And you're asking me to leave it all behind to journey out into the wild and risk my life."

"It would be a risk, yes, but you'll be trained.  We aren't leaving for the mountain until a year's time.  You would be taken first to Erud Luin where you'll be prepared for the quest ahead," Dís reassured.

The hobbit's pacing slowed.  He hadn't been expecting that.  "Prepared how?"

"You'll be trained to use weapons.  You'll be shown survival skills and exercises to train both the body and mind.  A year from now you'd be well equipped to make the journey," Thorin told him calmly.

Bilbo caught Gandalf's eye and the wizard winked and smiled around his pipe.  The scoundrel!  He'd meant for Bilbo to be dragged into this.

"You're asking the impossible. All of you are."

"There will be a reward.  You'll have a share of the gold."  Thorin was watching him closely.  "It won't be modest."

"Hobbits don't value treasure, I'm afraid.  Besides, I haven't a need for any gold even if I wanted it.  And it certainly isn't worth the risk of having fire breathed into my face!"

The dwarven siblings shared a glance.  Unexpectedly, the sister began to hum.  It was quiet and smooth, and grew steadily into a soft and mournful sound until she started to sing words.

_Far over the misty mountains cold_  
_To dungeons deep and caverns old_  


Thorin's deep tone joined hers, followed by the booming echo of Dwalin's voice, and all three dwarves were singing together.  Bilbo had never heard a song like it before.  It wrapped around his heart like warm tea, and he felt a burning swell in his chest from the powerful emotion carried in the words.  

_We must away, ere break of day,_  
_To claim our long-forgotten gold_  


He watched as Thorin reached for his sister's hand across the table, giving it a squeeze.  She smiled sadly at her brother, eyes shining with distant memories, and Bilbo was struck by the depth of feeling these dwarves had.  They treasured their gold but there was more to them than that.  They had a deep kinship and shared sense of loss for a home that was theirs no longer.

The hobbit was moved by what he was witnessing and was left unsure how to react once they finished.  So he did what came naturally, which was manners.

"What a terrible host I've been!  You must be famished after your travels."  His own voice sounded out of place in the wake of their eloquent song.

"Aye," the burly dwarf Dwalin grumbled.

"I'll bring you something to eat from the kitchen.  Excuse me.  I'll just be a moment."  And he rushed from the room, heart speeding.  Once in the hall he leaned against the nearest wall and closed his eyes, the sound of their music still echoing in his mind. 

  


He felt sure that it would forever haunt him.  


End file.
